Nebo Foundation Grants Awarded in November 2017

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Nebo Education Foundation board members meet each month to review and award grant requests, consider fund-raising avenues, and other items that advance the educational opportunities for Nebo School District students. The Nebo Education Foundation functions through generous donations made by individuals and businesses.

Foundation past president, Kristina Christensen, said, "It is a pleasure to receive the grant applications and see how remarkable and creative the Nebo District teachers are. The Nebo Education Foundation facilitates these grant monies to help teachers realize their ideas and the students' potential. Our foundation board gets to see a glimpse at how well our teachers are instructing our students."

Goshen & Santaquin Elementary - Lynn Hansen“I am so excited to start using the SKILLS program at my schools! This program will support language instruction that provides our students with a solid oral language framework. This language framework is critical not only in language arts, and early literacy but across all academic topics. Thanks so much for giving our students and therapists the materials needed to be successful in the classroom and the community,” said Lynn Hansen, Speech and Language teacher at Santaquin and Goshen Elementaries.

Payson Junior High - Christi Petrucka

“Thank you so much for this generous gift. We are excited to have this new piano enrich our music instruction in the classroom. Our jazz band students will have the ability to develop their improvisational skills with a real time accompaniment band in the piano. We will be able to make recordings of the pieces not found anywhere else, on a multi -track recorder and sound mixer programmed into the piano to send to the students to help with their study and practice on their current curriculum literature. Because of the huge range of different instrument sounds, we will not be limited to literature with just the instrumentation we have in the student body of our group. If no student is playing oboe that year, we can still have an oboe during the concert. The choir and drama departments also will be able to have accompaniments not just limited to a piano sound, but enrich their performance accompaniments,” explained Christi Petrucka, Orchestra teacher at Payson Junior High.

Rees Elementary - Rachel Watts

“I am so grateful for my Nebo Education Foundation Grant! I will be using this money to buy two language-teaching programs, Story Champs and SKILLS, that emphasize language in literacy. At any given time, Rees has around 80 students receiving speech therapy that can benefit from these lessons to improve their academic language. In addition to students on our caseload, we provide group lessons in the Kindergarten classes to help provide these fundamental communication skills before they ever have to be placed in special education. I'm grateful for the generosity of the Nebo Education Foundation, so I can have the tools in my toolbox to enable our program to use evidenced based practice, so our students can have the highest benefit from our services,” said Rachel Watts, Speech teacher at Rees Elementary.

Sierra Bonita Elementary - Amy Staheli“I want to thank Nebo Education Foundation for the generous donation to my classroom. This donation will help purchase four new Chromebooks which will benefit all of my 29 students this year and for years to come. My students will have opportunities to spend time on learning programs for language arts, reading, and math. These Chromebooks will also provide the ability to learn technology skills that will help my students in all academic areas. I am so excited to be one step closer to a one-to-one initiative classroom,” stated Amy Staheli, third-grade teacher at Sierra Bonita Elementary.

Spanish Fork Junior High - Heather Mendonsa“I was surprised and pleased to be presented with the check for a technology grant this morning. What a gift! This is my first year at Spanish Fork Junior High so I am at the beginning phase of gathering supplies for class. This money will enable me to get headphones for the Chromebooks we have in class, as well as a set of mouses. Our new science program stresses the importance of inquiry. There are numerous websites we could not use because we needed the mouses for interactive sites. This opens the door for a higher quality and more engaging classroom. Thank you for your support, as well as the Nebo Foundation, in providing a higher level of education to our students,” said Heather Mendonsa, Science teacher at Spanish Fork Junior High School.

Spanish Oaks Elementary - Heidi Dimmick“I would like to thank the Nebo Foundation for the grant for books to add to our guided reading library in the M-P levels as well as higher level books that are appropriate for third-grade students. Third-grade is a pivotal year where students go from learning to read to reading to learn. It's so important to help them find books that they love. When students are exposed to books that are in a series that they like then they are more likely to continue reading the series. This helps students to love reading. Thank you for making this possible!” exclaimed Heidi Dimmick, third-grade teacher at Spanish Oaks Elementary.

Sage Creek Elementary - Erica Murdoch“As a recent recipient of a Nebo Foundation Grant I am anxious to use the funds awarded to purchase additional titles for my school’s guided reading library. To me it is especially important to expose young readers to a variety of different texts. With the funds donated we will be able to expand our guided reading library and add several additional titles for upper level readers, both fiction and nonfiction. In my own classroom I have seen how students are especially motivated to read when they have a book of high interest to them that is also at their “just right” level. When this occurs, student progress also heightens. Adding more captivating texts to our leveled library is certain to have a positive impact on both student motivation and performance,” explained Erica Murdoch, sixth-grade teacher at Sage Creek Elementary.

Sage Creek Elementary - Leslie Ewell“I was so pleased to receive a grant from the Nebo Education Foundation. The guided reading resource I am purchasing will give the teachers at our school materials to dive into numerous nonfiction genres. They will provide for them leveled short texts to use in guided reading, helping students to experience many types of nonfiction writing and allowing teachers to deepen comprehension. I believe that this resource will impact many students for years to come. Again, I am so grateful to the Nebo Education Foundation for providing a way for us to purchase this resource for our students at Sage Creek Elementary,” said Leslie Ewell, facilitator at Sage Creek Elementary.

Brookside Elementary - Esther Brophy“We are so excited to be able to purchase the "Go Talk Now" devices. These augmentative and alternative communication devices (AAC) will help many non-verbal students be able to express themselves and will empower them with a voice. We love working with these students and can't wait to be able to use these devices! Thank you so much for putting the children's needs first here in Nebo School District!” exclaimed Esther Brophy, speech therapist at Brookside Elementary.

Springville Junior High - Stephanie Riggs“Springville Junior High and I are excited and honored to have received this grant from the Nebo Foundation. The money will be spent to replace the classroom set of Chromebooks, which are used in all seven of my classes. My Creative Writing and Secondary Reading classes are especially thrilled to have fast, reliable, technology for their daily writing and reading programs, since this has been a struggle to accomplish this year on the older Chromebooks. Now, stories and essays can come to life at the same speed they are thought of, allowing the creative juices to flow. Thank you so much for your generosity and support,” said Stephanie Riggs, English teacher at Springville Junior High.

Hobble Creek Elementary - Crystal Hayes“Thank you so much for funding our grant. We have been working hard to implement STEM into our curriculum. Through our efforts we have found we were in need of several supplies to help us build and learn. We plan on implementing our STEM supplies in math, reading, science, and social studies. Our main goal for our grant is to find supplies that will help our student become self motivated learners through STEM oriented activities,” explained Crystal Hayes, first-grade teacher at Hobble Creek Elementary.

Brockbank Elementary - Jeff Loreen, Kristel Peterson, JaNae Wilson“Brockbank Elementary 6th graders want to thank the Nebo Education Foundation for funding our science-based field trip to Salem Pond. Through the years this has been an integral hands-on learning opportunity for our students. This year, with the adjusted science curriculum, we can also spend time studying the water cycle, as well as ecosystems and how they change depending on the many factors in the environment at Salem Pond. We are so appreciative for the support of quality education that the Nebo Education Foundation helps us teachers provide. Thank you!” exclaimed the sixth-grade teachers at Brockbank Elementary.

East Meadows Elementary - Jaelle Judkins, Stevie Carr, Sydney Sharp, Suzanne Aguero“Thank you so much for providing us with a grant to go to Salem Pond. Through this grant the 3rd grade classes at East Meadows Elementary were able to better understand the interactions between living and nonliving things. Our students enjoyed participating in activities around the pond. They were able to collect, observe, and analyze various specimens in their natural habitats. Such an interactive experience would not have been possible without your support. Thank you again!” said the third-grade teachers at East Meadows Elementary.